Students used to need bucket loads of imagination and lengthy verbal explanations from the teacher to understand how the human body regulates water content and maintains a constant condition to ensure tissues and cells function properly. But now pupils can literally look inside a kidney, take it apart, magnify it by cross-section and explore the body's remarkable filtration system - without getting their hands dirty. It's all thanks to 3-D imagery on the now ubiquitous interactive whiteboard.

At St Monica's RC high school, a specialist language college in Bury, the boards have been used by teachers for the past four years - and for many schools they have revolutionised lessons, according to science teacher Paul Jordan. "At first, interactive whiteboards were a phenomenon with pupils because of the opportunities they offered. Perhaps [pupils] have become a bit complacent and take them for granted now. So I don't use the whiteboard in every lesson, only where I consider it will be of most benefit."

His class doesn't remember a time when IWBs were not a feature of lessons. Chris Taggart, 15, says the visual imagery helped pupils to concentrate on the lesson, and fewer had the opportunity to daydream. They also save time. "The combination of the teacher explaining something that might be complicated, such as angles [in maths], and seeing it come to life on the screen means it takes a lot less time to understand," he says.

Restricted access

But not all secondary pupils around the country have access to a whiteboard and even where they do their effectiveness is mixed.

A report out earlier this year from the educational thinktank Futurelab found that while technology captivates and engages pupils where it is used effectively, it had not led to increased achievement. This was in contrast to the impact in primaries, where whiteboards had contributed to raising standards.

Where they were used well in secondary schools IWBs were versatile and practical, allowing teachers to save, store and reuse information, and to present content in different styles. This, in turn, led to greater pupil understanding of what was being taught.

But questions remained over how much whiteboards had enhanced learning. Studies found that they did not improve poor teaching, and only well-trained teachers who had had time to experiment and become familiar with technology delivered more effective lessons. It is that mix of using technology and pedagogy - the art of teaching - that seems to be the biggest obstacle. Part of the problem, according to Tim Rudd, senior researcher at Futurelab, is that teachers have found it hard to stop controlling the learning in lessons, rather than facilitating it.

"We can look at the impact of whiteboards over time, but there are many other variables at work, including the amount of time teachers are given to innovate and experiment," he says.

"Secondary teachers feel constrained by the curriculum and the culture of testing and league tables. If they are not comfortable with using whiteboards they will stick to what they know best to achieve the outcomes they want."

Paul Berry, UK managing director of Promethean, one of the largest makers of IWBs, agrees that teachers have other distractions. The company is working to make the technology more accessible to teachers, and offers online tutorials and downloadable lessons.

"Our job is not to sell more whiteboards but to get them used by more teachers more proficiently. We have to try to instil a willingness in an ageing profession to change the way it does things," he says.

Angela McFarlane, head of the graduate school of education at Bristol University, and a board member of Futurelab, says too many schools were using IWB as "a very expensive data projector". "In nine out of 10 schools I visit there is only one cable plugged into the teacher's laptop, and that is the projector. The whiteboard cable is out.

"Teachers tend to use the technology as a means of holding the pupils' attention, when what they need to do is find better ways of allowing learners to use the technology themselves."

Do they actually work?

Gemma Moss's report, Interactive Whiteboards, Pedagogy and Pupil Performance, looked at the effectiveness of whiteboard expansion in London secondary schools and formed part of the Futurelab analysis.

Dr Moss, from London University's Institute of Education, says the research found no evidence of any improvement in attainment as a result of whiteboard use and in some cases was just "window-dressing" for poor teaching technique.

"We saw one lesson where it was used in science to show the gravitational force of a jump jet and pupils were asked to move arrows on the board to show where they thought the force was coming from. This had nothing to do with explaining gravitational force. The images may have engaged pupils in the exercise but did not help them to understand about gravity."

Worryingly, her study, published in summer 2006, also found reluctance by some pupils to use the technology themselves. "In one lesson, pupils were invited to the front of the class to use the whiteboard to work out a problem, but they saw this as the teachers' space and felt embarrassed if they got it wrong. This is not a creative use of the technology," she says.

Ray Barker, director of the British Educational Suppliers Association, says the future of whiteboards probably lies in a new generation of technology which is beginning to be used in schools. Small, hand-held devices, linked to whiteboards and the teachers' laptop, can be used to assess pupils in tests, monitor their work, store information about each child and map their progress over time.

"These devices will be important in the move towards personalised learning because of the scope they give to assess progress and tailor teaching to each child," he says.

Peter Robinson, Bury's schools science adviser, has been working with St Monica's and other secondaries on developing IWB use and pedagogical packs for teachers.

Teacher training

He says there is still a lack of effective training for teachers to combine the potential of the technology with their own teaching styles.

"The best teachers often don't have access to a whiteboard in their class, so overall there is not enough creative use of them in schools," he says.

"Some IWB providers do half a day's training in the mechanics after installation, which gives no time for practice. Teachers end up remembering what the whiteboard can do, but not how to do it."

But he adds that whiteboards and similar technologies are here to stay. "The changing ways in which teaching takes place will provide better outlets for interactive whiteboards in the future.

"The increased use of peer assessment will allow pupils to compare their work effectively using boards and other devices. In future, they are likely to be used less by teachers than by pupils themselves."

If used properly though, whiteboards could be a key teaching tool for many years. St Monica's student Alison Walsh, 14, remains impressed by her lesson: "The image of the kidney zoomed in on blood vessels and the little tubes that help us with filtration. It's brilliant. A printed picture just wouldn't have that impact."